Tag,you're different: the interrupted spaces of children at risk of anaphylaxis

Several contributions to understanding the emotional aspects of everyday lives have been made by geographers. What we undertake in this research is to focus that lens on the emotional context of experiences of children at risk and in particular on anaphylactic risk-scapes, particularly within the school environment. This research attempts to go beyond the policy response by privileging the voices of the affected children (and their parents) in order to understand the emotionality of their risk experience; how it is articulated and negotiated in place, and how bodily boundaries are interrupted. Qualitative methods were used to explore children's perceptions of, and experiences with, anaphylactic allergy in the school environment. In-depth interviews were conducted with 10 children (aged 8–12 years) and 10 adolescents (aged 13–17 years) and their parents. Children were also asked to draw a picture of ‘what it was like to live with a severe food allergy’ and to then explain their illustration. Results revealed how the spaces of children at risk of anaphylaxis were interrupted; social spaces were interrupted through their bodily experiences of risk as they negotiated in and through school environments. These findings suggest allergic children contest school and policy constructions of ‘safe place’ through the interrupted spaces and bodily disruptions of emotion.     

Rumours of Angels: a response to Simpson

Stone-throwing by demons and witches and the mischievous activities of kobolds in mines are reviewed as part of an investigation into the darker folklore history of geology. Lithobolia has a pedigree extending from classical times, but sixteenth-century and seventeenth-century reports are particularly common. The existence of kobolds, who tormented miners by episodes of stone-throwing and mineral-switching, was accepted by clergy, laity and scientists alike. [1] ?[1] This paper is one of a series dealing with the general topic of “geology and the dark side.” The papers investigate, for the first time, the connection between geology and the occult. Each of the papers is distinct in contents. Main threads include folklore association between fossils, rocks and minerals and various supernatural entities as expressed in colloquial nomenclature of geological specimens (Duffin and Davidson 2011 Duffin, Christopher John and Davidson, Jane P. 2011. Geology and the Dark Side. Proceedings of the Geologists' Association, 122(1): 7–15. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), geological materials used by supernatural entities such as the devils or witches, divination using geological materials, and the use of geological materials as protective agents against witchcraft (Duffin, 2011).      

“Born to be a Stoway”: Inscriptions,Graffiti, and the Rupture of Space at the North Head Quarantine Station,Sydney

Quarantine was used by British colonial authorities and later by Australian governments to manage and control the introduction of infectious diseases. Facilities at North Head, Manly, New South Wales, were initially built as a specialist institution but as the need for mass quarantine declined over time, the site was used for other forms of social regulation and welfare. This paper explores an enduring tradition of memorialization, commemoration, and in some instances, resistance to the conditions of isolation and confinement found in the mark-making practices of people held at the Quarantine Station from the 1830s to the 1970s.     

Theorising the role of cultural products in cultural diplomacy from a Cultural Studies perspective

Cultural diplomacy continues to attract significant interest as a potential means for states to exercise ‘soft power’. However, policy-makers and academics who assert the efficacy of cultural diplomacy in terms of influencing foreign publics and states rarely consider how cultural products are actually received abroad. This article proposes that this process of reception can be better understood with reference to the theoretical approaches of Cultural Studies, which encourage us to recognise the extent to which audiences are implicated in processes of meaning-making, processes which are closely associated with the articulation of identity. By applying these approaches to cultural diplomacy, policy-makers and researchers could shift their focus to an exploration of realities of the reception cultural products abroad, which would better inform their assumptions about how to achieve successful cultural diplomacy.     

Soft power and dark heritage: multiple potentialities

Abstract

While positively connoted tangible cultural heritage is widely recognized as an asset to states in their exercise of soft power, the value of sites of ‘dark heritage’ in the context of soft power strategies has not yet been fully explored. This article offers a theoretical framework for the analysis of the multiple soft power potentialities inherent in the management and presentation of sites of past violence and atrocity, demonstrating how the value of these sites can be developed in terms of place branding, cultural diplomacy and state-level diplomacy. The relationship between dark heritage, soft power and the search for ‘ontological security’ is also explored, highlighting how difficult pasts can be mobilized in order to frame positive contemporary roles for states in the international system. Drawing on this theoretical framework, the article offers an analysis of the case of the So?a valley in Slovenia and the presentation of the site of the First World War battle of Kobarid in a dedicated museum. Through this case study, the article underlines the particular role of dark heritage for the national self-projection of a new and small state in the context of European integration.